Eyal Goldshmid: Missing file may have been accidently uninstalled

What goes into making "imitation milk?" Find out for yourself at this stylish, humorous destination. Designed as a 1950s-era educational short (complete with scratchy film stock and cheesy background music), the site puts you front and center in a mock laboratory, where you help some virtual students construct various forms of imitation milk (such as almond milk, etc.). Of course, plenty of goofy gags get thrown in along the way, making this more of a comedy skit than a science lesson. Still, the laughs are plentiful and the site's interactivity allows for several outcomes, making each visit different.

Q: Whenever I turn on my laptop, I get a message stating the following: "This application failed to start because powrprof.dll was not found. Re-installing the application may fix this problem." What is this and how do I get rid of it?

— Donna Bermas, Port St. Lucie

A: POWRPROF.DLL is a file that's found within the Windows System folder. It's also a file than some programs share with Windows for everyday operation. Sometimes, when you uninstall a program that shares that file with Windows, the removal process will remove the POWRPROF.DLL file as well, and a message like the one you're seeing will be generated to notify you of the error. That sounds like what's happening here. There are several solutions to this problem, many of which are available at this URL: http://bit.ly/SoxtQ9

Q: Lately I have been receiving a lot of emails with attachments that I cannot open. I believe there is a program that will assist in opening these programs. Could you help me find that program?

— Walt Cobourn, Port St. Lucie

A: If you receive an email with an attached file, and do not have the specific program required to view that file already installed on your computer, then your computer will not be able to display the contents of that file to you.

However, if you find out what program you need to do this, you can simply install it and the contents of the attached file will become accessible to you.

To find out which program you need to view that file, first look at the filename of the attachment you've received and take note of the last three letters of the filename (meaning, after the period). These letters are known as the filename extension, and they tell the computer which program to launch when the file is clicked. Examples of the extension include: "filename.ppt," "filename.pdf," or "filename.doc."

Search Google for the filename extension of your attachment file, along with the term "program type" (in that your search criteria will read, for example, "doc program type"). The search results should tell you what program opens or corresponds to that file type.

Once you know that, search Google again for that program by name. This time, the search results should produce produce information pages for that program. Visit those sites to obtain the program, either via download or purchase, and then install the program once you have downloaded it.